Archive

Quotes

I am invariably of the politics of the people at whose table I sit, or beneath whose roof I sleep.

—George Borrow, 1843

Sic semper tyrannis! The South is avenged.

—John Wilkes Booth, 1865

Every country has the government it deserves.

—Joseph de Maistre, 1811

Television has made dictatorship impossible, but democracy unbearable.

—Shimon Peres, 1995

The Revolution is made by man, but man must forge his revolutionary spirit from day to day.

—Che Guevara, 1968

You should never have your best trousers on when you go out to fight for freedom and truth.

—Henrik Ibsen, 1882

Written laws are like spiderwebs: they will catch, it is true, the weak and poor but would be torn in pieces by the rich and powerful.

—Anacharsis, c. 550 BC

The affairs of the world are no more than so much trickery, and a man who toils for money or honor or whatever else in deference to the wishes of others, rather than because his own desire or needs lead him to do so, will always be a fool.

—Johann Wolfgang von Goethe, 1774

There is nothing more tyrannical than a strong popular feeling among a democratic people.

—Anthony Trollope, 1862

O citizens, first acquire wealth; you can practice virtue afterward.

—Horace, c. 8 BC

Treaties, you see, are like girls and roses: they last while they last.

—Charles de Gaulle, 1963

The more corrupt the republic, the more numerous the laws.

—Tacitus, c. 117

I am no courtesan, nor moderator, nor tribune, nor defender of the people: I am myself the people.

—Maximilien Robespierre, 1792